Lotus Sutra The Lotus Sutra or Lotus Sūtra (सद्धर्मपुण्डरीकसूत्रम्, Saddharma Puṇḍarīka Sūtra, ‘Sūtra on the White Lotus of the True Dharma’) is one of the most influential and venerated Buddhist Mahāyāna sūtras. It is the main scripture on which the Tiantai, Tendai, Cheontae, and Nichiren schools of Buddhism were established. It is also influential for other East Asian...
Soka Gakkai Soka Gakkai (創価学会, Sōka Gakkai, “Value-Creation Society”) is a Japanese Buddhist religious movement based on the teachings of the 13th-century Japanese priest Nichiren as taught by its first three presidents Tsunesaburō Makiguchi, Jōsei Toda, and Daisaku Ikeda. It is the largest of the Japanese new religions and claims the largest membership among Nichiren Buddhist groups. “The organization bases its teachings...
Ultimate Reality Ultimate reality is “something that is the supreme, final, and fundamental power in all reality.” This heavily overlaps with the concept of the Absolute in certain philosophies. Abrahamic religions Main article: God in Abrahamic religions In Abrahamic religions, a non-anthropomorphic God is the supreme power behind and beyond all things. God is described as...
Korean Seon Seon, or Seon Buddhism or Sŏn Buddhism (Korean: 선, 禪) is the Korean name for Chan Buddhism, a branch of Mahāyāna Buddhism commonly known in English as Zen Buddhism. Seon is the Sino-Korean pronunciation of Chan (Chinese: 禪; pinyin: chán) an abbreviation of 禪那 (chánnà), which is a Chinese transliteration of the Sanskrit word of dhyāna (“meditation“). Seon...
Lankavatara Sutra The Laṅkāvatāra Sūtra (लंकावतारसूत्र, ལང་ཀར་བཤེགས་པའི་མདོ་) is a prominent Mahayana Buddhist sūtra. This sūtra recounts a teaching primarily between Gautama Buddha and a bodhisattva named Mahāmati, “Great Wisdom”. The sūtra is set in Laṅkā, the island fortress capital of Rāvaṇa, the king of the rākṣasa demons. The title of this text roughly translates as “Scripture of the...
Japanese Zen Japanese Zen refers to the Japanese forms of Zen Buddhism, an originally Chinese Mahāyāna school of Buddhism that strongly emphasizes dhyāna, the meditative training of awareness and equanimity. This practice, according to Zen proponents, gives insight into one’s true nature, or the emptiness of inherent existence, which opens the way to a liberated way of living. History...
Middle Way The Middle Way or Middle Path is the term that Gautama Buddha used to describe the character of the Noble Eightfold Path he discovered that leads to liberation. Theravada Buddhism and the Pali canon Dhamacakkappavattana Sutta In the Pāli Canon of Theravada Buddhism, the term “Middle Way” was used in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, which the Buddhist tradition regards to be the...
Buddhism In Vietnam Buddhism in Vietnam or Vietnamese Buddhism (Đạo Phật or Phật Giáo), as practised by the ethnic Vietnamese, is mainly of the Mahayana tradition. Buddhism may have first come to Vietnam as early as the 3rd or 2nd century BCE from the Indian subcontinent or from China in the 1st or 2nd century CE. Vietnamese Buddhism has had a syncretic relationship...
Korean Buddhism Korean Buddhism is distinguished from other forms of Buddhism by its attempt to resolve what it sees as inconsistencies in Mahayana Buddhism. Early Korean monks believed that the traditions they received from foreign countries were internally inconsistent. To address this, they developed a new holistic approach to Buddhism. This approach is characteristic of...
East Asian Buddhism East Asian Buddhism or East Asian Mahayana is a collective term for the schools of Mahāyāna Buddhism that developed in East Asia and follow the Chinese Buddhist canon. These include the various forms of Chinese Buddhism, Japanese Buddhism, Vietnamese Buddhism, and Korean Buddhism. Besides being a major religion in...
![A reproduction of the palm-leaf manuscript in Siddham script, originally held at Hōryū-ji Temple, Japan; now located in the Tokyo National Museum at the Gallery of Hōryū—ji Treasure. The original copy may be the earliest extant Sanskrit manuscript dated to the 7th–8th century CE.[1]](https://slife.org/wp-content/uploads/Falongsibeiye-520x211.png)
Heart Sutra The Heart Sūtra (प्रज्ञापारमिताहृदय Prajñāpāramitāhṛdaya: 心經 Xīnjīng) is a popular sutra in Mahāyāna Buddhism. Its Sanskrit title, Prajñāpāramitāhṛdaya, can be translated as “The Heart of the Perfection of Wisdom“. The sutra famously states, “Form is empty, emptiness is form.” (śūnyatā). It is a condensed exposé on the Buddhist Mahayana teaching of the Two...
Zen Proverbs Below you will find our collection of inspirational, wise, and humorous old Zen Proverbs, Zen quotes, and Zen sayings, collected over the years from a variety of sources. Enjoy reading these insights and feel free to share this page on your social media to inspire others. Please DO page find...
Kshanti Kshanti or khanti is patience, forbearance and forgiveness. It is one of the pāramitās in both Theravāda and Mahāyāna Buddhism. Canonical sources Examples in the Pāli canon identify using forbearance in response to others’ anger, cuckolding, torture and even fatal assaults. Dhammapada verses Khanti is the first word of the Ovada-Patimokkha Gatha (Pāli for “Patimokkha Exhortation Verse”), also found in the Dhammapada, verse...
What Is Zen? Zen (禪; Chán, 선) is a school of Mahayana Buddhism that originated in China during the Tang dynasty as Chan Buddhism. It was strongly influenced by Taoism and developed as a distinct school of Chinese Buddhism. From China, Chan Buddhism spread south to Vietnam which became Vietnamese Thiền, northeast to Korea and east to Japan, where it became...
Prajñāpāramitā Prajñāpāramitā means “the Perfection of (Transcendent) Wisdom” in Mahāyāna Buddhism. Prajñāpāramitā refers to this perfected way of seeing the nature of reality, as well as to a particular body of sutras and to the personification of the concept in the Bodhisattva known as the “Great Mother” (Tibetan: Yum Chenmo). The word...
Tripitaka Tripitaka or Tripiṭaka (Tipiṭaka) is the traditional term for the Buddhist scriptures. The version canonical to Theravada Buddhism is generally referred to in English as the Pali Canon. Mahayana Buddhism also holds the Tripiṭaka to be authoritative but, unlike Theravadins, it also includes in its canon various derivative literature and commentaries that were...
Vinaya The Vinaya (“leading out”, “education”, “discipline”) is the regulatory framework for the sangha or monastic community of Buddhism based on the canonical texts called the Vinaya Pitaka. The teachings of the Gautama Buddha can be divided into two broad categories: Dharma “doctrine” and Vinaya “discipline”. Extant vinaya texts include those of the Theravada (the only...
Vimalakirti Sutra The Vimalakirti Sutra or The Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa (विमलकीर्तिनिर्देश), or (the Vimalakīrti Sūtra or Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa Sūtra) is a Mahayana Buddhist sutra. It was extremely influential in East Asia, but most likely of considerably less importance in the Indian and Tibetan sub-traditions of Mahāyāna Buddhism. The word nirdeśa in the title means “instruction, advice”, and...
Mahayana Sutras The Mahayana sutras are a broad genre of Buddhist scriptures that various traditions of Mahayana Buddhism accept as canonical. They are largely preserved in the Chinese Buddhist canon, the Tibetan Buddhist canon, and in extant Sanskrit manuscripts. Around one hundred Mahayana sutras survive in Sanskrit, or in Chinese...
Mahayana Mahayana or Mahāyāna (“Great Vehicle”) is one of two main existing branches of Buddhism (the other being Theravada) and a term for classification of Buddhist philosophies and practice. This movement added a further set of discourses, and although it was initially small in India, it had long-term historical significance....